Spoiler: Steps of Faith Can Be Terrifying

Ever smile in a photo even though you are also a little terrified? I did that in the photo above. Let me explain.

This photo is from ten months ago. Ten months ago I felt called to leave my nursing career to work as an artist. This is the first art show I had done in a decade. I landed it the day after I quit my nursing job. But I didn’t know this show was coming when I left. I had ideas and plans, but no concrete view of how my day-to-day would look. This is the face of someone who had stepped out on water a little bit and was terrified to sink. I only knew the next step, not much more.

Leading up to the decision, Mike and I had begun praying in a more focused way about our careers. For months, a good friend of mine and I prayed weekly together about our respective career circumstances. I’m sure our families had also been praying for this too, because they knew our hearts. We knew God had more planned for us than what we were experiencing, but we didn’t know what it was.

God knew, though.

So we leaned into the uncomfortable place, namely, we recognized we did not have the answers or the way to get to where our hearts compelled us. So we asked God for help. And as James 4:8 says, “draw near to God, and he will draw near to you.” And as we drew closer to Him, we felt more confident in His call. That big first step in faith led to many other steps in faith. About four months after this photo, Mike had his own massive career change (which is its own super wild story), which also led to a lot more change for both of us. Fast forward ten months from this photo and almost everything in our daily lives is different.

We live in a new place over 1000 miles away from our family and friends.

We call a new place home, in a totally different climate.

We are part of a new church, which we didn’t think would happen since we adored our old church.

My point of all is that when we take action on our faith and trust God, He rewards with closeness to Him. He rewards with encouragement. He rewards with the next step. Obviously trusting God also means loving others, so we shouldn’t go around rashly making decisions expecting God to bless them just because we labeled them “a call from God.” It requires prayer and discernment and often wise counsel.

Anyway- I still don’t have all the answers I want. I still have a lot of gray area about things like my longterm business plan. But I am learning to take action when I hear God’s call, and not just be a hearer of the word and be self-deceived (James 1:22). It’s not easy, and it takes a lot of asking God for wisdom. But, friends, the joy of stepping out and answering Him when he calls? That is truly priceless.

I hope this little story helps you to seek Him more today and maybe take that next step in faith!